# Not a Tobacco tax, but another Sin Tax



## phatmax (Mar 18, 2009)

Once again. Pray they HC bill does not pass. Not only are we targets, so is everything else anyone actually enjoys. Sin taxes on foods that make you "fat"... (not that lack of exercise or eating too much is doing that, it is the FOOD'S fault)

If you choose to be a certain wieght or eat certain food, so be it, that is your choice and you should not be punished.

Read this and always tell people this:

"A government that has the power to give you everything has the power to take everything AWAY"

Or for the under 25 crowd... "Allowing government to act like your parents will allow them to treat you like a child"

Government defined "fattening foods" and you know the hemp wearing hippies that will be in charge of that will be defining meat as fattening, so their vegan utopia will come to fruition.

From the LATimes:

*Tough love for fat people: Tax their food to pay for healthcare (Fixed)*

2:33 PM, July 27, 2009
When historians look back to identify the pivotal moments in the nation's struggle against obesity, they might point to the current period as the moment when those who influenced opinion and made public policy decided it was time to take the gloves off.
As evidence of this new "get-tough" strategy on obesity, they may well cite a study released today by the Urban Institute titled "Reducing Obesity: Policy Strategies From the Tobacco Wars."
In the debate over healthcare reform, the added cost of caring for patients with obesity-related diseases has become a common refrain: most recent is the cost-of-obesity study, also released today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It finds that as obesity rates increased from 18.3% of Americans in 1998 to 25% in 2006, the cost of providing treatment for those patients' weight-driven problems increased healthcare spending by $40 billion a year. 
If you happen to be the 1-in-3 Americans who is neither obese nor overweight (and, thus, considered at risk of becoming obese), you might well conclude that the habits of the remaining two-thirds of Americans are costing you, big time. U.S. life expectancies are expected to slide backward, after years of marching upward. (But that's their statistical problem: Yours is how to make them stop costing you all that extra money because they are presumably making poor choices in their food consumption.)

"Facing the serious consequences of an uncontrolled obesity epidemic, America's state and federal policy makers may need to consider interventions every bit as forceful as those that succeeded in cutting adult tobacco use by more than 50%," the Urban Institute report says. It took awhile -- almost 50 years from the first surgeon general's report on tobacco in 1964 -- to drive smoking down. But in many ways, the drumbeat of scientific evidence and the growing cultural stigma against obesity already are well underway -- as any parent who has tried to bring birthday cupcakes into her child's classroom certainly knows.
Key among the "interventions" the report weighs is that of imposing an excise or sales tax on fattening foods. That, says the report, could be expected to lower consumption of those foods. But it would also generate revenues that could be used to extend health insurance coverage to the uninsured and under-insured, and perhaps to fund campaigns intended to make healthy foods more widely available to, say, low-income Americans and to encourage exercise and healthy eating habits.
If anti-tobacco campaigns are to be the model, those sales taxes could be hefty: The World Health Organization has recommended that tobacco taxes should represent between two-thirds and three-quarters of the cost of, say, a package of cigarettes; a 2004 report prepared for the Department of Agriculture suggested that, for "sinful-food" taxes to change the way people eat, they may need to equal at least 10% to 30% of the cost of the food.
And although 40 U.S. states now impose modest extra sales taxes on soft drinks and a few snack items, the Urban Institute report suggests that a truly forceful "intervention" -- one that would drive down the consumption of fattening foods and, presumably, prevent or reverse obesity -- would have to target pretty much all the fattening and nutritionally empty stuff we eat: "With a more narrowly targeted tax, consumers could simply substitute one fattening food or beverage for another," the reports says.
Of course, the United States also would have to adopt extensive menu- and food-labeling changes that would make "good foods" easily distinguishable from the bad ones subject to added taxes. Not to worry though: Several European countries, most notably Great Britain, have led the way in this area.
And here's the payoff: Conservatively estimated, a 10% tax levied on foods that would be defined as "less healthy" by a national standard adopted recently in Great Britain could yield $240 billion in its first five years and $522 billion over 10 years of implementation -- if it were to begin in October 2010. If lawmakers instituted a program of tax subsidies to encourage the purchase of fresh and processed fruits and vegetables, the added revenue would still be $356 billion over 10 years.
That would pay for a lot of healthcare reform, which some have estimated will cost as much as $1 trillion to implement over the next ten years.
There can be little doubt that lobbyists for the food, restaurant and grocery industries would come out swinging on any of these proposals. But the report cites evidence of a turning political tide for proposals that would hold the obese and other consumers of nutritionally suspect food accountable for their choices. A recent national poll found that 53% of Americans said they favored an increased tax on sodas and sugary soft drinks to help pay for healthcare reform. And even among those who opposed such an idea, 63% switched and said they'd favor such a tax if it "would raise money for health-care reform while also tackling the problems that stem from being overweight."


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## suretolose (Jul 8, 2009)

This will only stop if the people make it stop


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## Nismo#12 (Jun 14, 2009)

When it comes down to it it a matter of calorie in and calories out. Don't tax bad behavior, reward good behavior. It works with people of all ages and dogs too. People respond better to postive reinforcement. 

Unfortunatly those in our government don't feel the same way. My hope is that with all the turbulence going on people will wake up, get informed on their own(don't rely on the media) and make the right decisions.


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## Stinkdyr (Jun 19, 2009)

How is that status quo hope and change socialism working out for you?
Or, you could vote Libertarian for a change.
Freedom...what a radical concept. Let's give it a try.


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## Blackcat (Aug 18, 2009)

suretolose said:


> This will only stop if the people make it stop


Ain't that the truth!


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## commonsenseman (Apr 18, 2008)

Scary stuff. Socialized medicine will give the government the power to tell us what to eat, because "it's for the good of the state". It won't stop there either, this is only the beginning. Makes me shudder thinking about it.


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## Blackcat (Aug 18, 2009)

commonsenseman said:


> Scary stuff. Socialized medicine will give the government the power to tell us what to eat, because "it's for the good of the state". It won't stop there either, this is only the beginning. Makes me shudder thinking about it.


I'm actually reading this boring cr&% (Health Bill) & after you get through the "Legaleze" spek, it kinda sounds scary for smokers


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## havanajohn (Apr 4, 2009)

This is just another step towards a 'Nanny State'. We gotta stop it!


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## tmanqz (Jun 15, 2009)

Soon we will only be able to eat "Soylent Green". I new this day was coming.


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## zeavran1 (Aug 18, 2009)

That's ok because I'm stupid and I don't know what's good for me. I need a politician to tell me what to do and what is good for me. duhhhhhhh


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## Blackcat (Aug 18, 2009)

tmanqz said:


> Soon we will only be able to eat "Soylent Green". I new this day was coming.


MMMMMMM "Soylant Green". Just started popping up on the shelves at our stores...BTW whats that stuff made of?


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